


Moving Pictures

by Eienvine



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Thor (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Celebrity, F/M, Sifki Week 2019
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-21
Updated: 2019-07-31
Packaged: 2020-07-09 20:13:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 16,314
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19893676
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Eienvine/pseuds/Eienvine
Summary: Being a movie star just makes certain things more complicated. Loki doesn't want to play the "poor little rich boy" card here, but it's a little hard to fight with your family, learn you're adopted, and pine silently for the woman who's never loved you back when the whole world is watching your every move.





	1. Confession

**Author's Note:**

> Here is the (slightly early) beginning of my offering for Sifki Week 2019!
> 
> I came up with a very elaborate backstory for day 7 (prompt: AU), which I then liked so much that I wanted to use it for more than one one-shot. So my offering for Sifki Week 2019 is going to be a single story, set within this AU; if I manage to finish what I have planned, there will be a chapter for each day, following the prompt for that day, but also advancing the overall story.
> 
> The first day's prompt: Confession.

. . . . . .

“You might recognize our next guest from movies such as _The Final Stream_ and _Red Shift,_ and he recently finished up playing Edmund in Kenji Ozu’s genre-bending—and award-winning—production of _King Lear._ Here to promote his new film, _City (Comma) State,_ is Loki Odinson!”

The woman with the headset nods at Loki, and he fixes his patented Public Appearance Smile to his face and strides out onto the stage with all the confidence he can muster, reminding himself all the while to have a good attitude about this appearance.

It’s not that he’s nervous; he’s been in front of the camera since he was seven years old. And it’s not that he doesn’t enjoy self-promotion; in fact he rather enjoys having people pay attention to him. It’s just . . . talk shows are all the same; he knows exactly what to expect. And he never looks forward to them.

The blonde host with the impossibly white teeth does at least make an effort to be interesting, at first. “First off, I have to say, loved you in _Lear_.”

“Oh, thank you,” says Loki, pleasantly surprised; he hadn’t known they were going to talk about this. And honestly, he hadn’t expected this perky talk show host to be interested in experimental stagings of Shakespearean classics.

“You’ve played a lot of villains in your time; is that coincidental or are you drawn to those roles?”

“Oh, I love playing villains,” Loki says. “Often there’s so much more meat to those roles—layers of depth you don’t always get in the heroes. Edmund is fascinating because he genuinely believes he’s justified in what he’s doing; it’s not fair that an accident of birth makes his brother the true heir and him the shameful illegitimate child, so why shouldn’t he rectify the situation? It’s a lot of fun to play with. And of course Kenji’s vision for the play was amazing; I loved exploring that world.”

And he’s just starting to hope that maybe this will actually turn into an interesting conversation—maybe this host will want to talk about Shakespeare or the joy of complex roles or why setting _Lear_ in a fantastical and violent dystopian future is such an interesting take on the story—when the host firmly shatters those hopes.

“And this trend you have of playing villains is especially interesting given your family,” she says, and Loki forces himself not to sigh. He’d known it was coming—she’d told him earlier that she wanted to discuss his background, and even if she hadn’t, he’d have known it was coming because it always, always comes up—so he’s only got himself to blame for getting his hopes up.

The host turns to the audience. “I think most of you know that Loki’s brother is Thor Odinson, who’s made a name for himself playing action heroes—his latest is _cyber.coma.static,_ coming out this summer—but you might not be aware that they come from . . .” She turns back to Loki. “Well, it’s basically a film dynasty, isn’t it? Your father is Odin Borrson, who we all know from so many great westerns and war movies, and your mother is producer Frigga Fjörgynnsdóttir. And—am I getting this right?—your grandfather is Borr Búrisson, the great song-and-dance actor from the 1950s, and your great-grandfather is Búri Ísson, who directed some of the very first talking pictures.”

Loki does hate this line of questioning a bit, but he dutifully adds, “And people often forget that Borr’s wife Bestla Bölþornsdottir was one of the first women to be nominated for the Best Director Academy Award.” He’s grown up on stories of Grandmother Bestla, and he thinks it rather unfair that people tend not to mention her when listing off the family accomplishments.

“Really amazing,” the host says. “So with this whole history of leading men in your family, your list of credits is a major departure—Shakespearean villains, tragic vampires, serial killers, your Marc Bolan biopic was amazing, by the way. Is that a deliberate choice?”

Yes and no, is the answer, but it is a topic far too complex and personal for him to delve into with this grinning stranger on national TV. So he fudges, “I’ve always been drawn to these sorts of roles. My first real film role as a child was in an independent film about this dysfunctional family, dealing with the father’s alcoholism, and my character was acting out because he’d been struggling with the repercussions of his home life, and I just loved it. I loved the realization that movies could be more than escapism; they could grapple with serious topics. And I’ve been drawn to those ever since.”

The host does not look convinced. They rarely do, he’s found. But, apparently giving up on the hope of uncovering some seething resentment that causes Loki to reject his family’s leading-man legacy _(joke’s on her,_ he thinks wearily, _my resentment is muted at most),_ she moves on to the film he’s come to promote.

And now Loki is happy to wax eloquent about what a fascinating screenplay it was, what a great environment there was on set, and how much he admires this new director, Darcy Lewis.

And the host dutifully exclaims over how great the film looks, how many awards it won at film festivals, how Darcy Lewis is sure to break out of indie films soon . . . Loki just tries to stifle his irritation at the implication that independent films are something that one grows out of and leaves behind once real success is reached, because it also implies that because he continues to elect to do indie films, he must not be particularly successful.

So his mood is already starting to fray when they finally leave the discussion of _City (Comma) State_ behind and the host leans forward with a conspiratorial air. “So talk to us about your dating life. You’ve been linked with rockers and models before, but you’ve never been with anyone very long-term. At least not openly enough for anyone to know about it. What’s that about?”

He knows what she’s going for—what all these hosts and journalists and paparazzi are always going for: is Loki Odinson gay? It’s the long hair, he knows, and the tendency toward androgynous fashion choices and similarly androgynous women, and the number of transvestites and glam rockers he’s played in his movies.

And he never stops resenting it. It’s none of their business either way. And why can’t he just like the things he likes, without everyone reading so much into it about his sexuality?

Besides, if he were gay, does this woman really think he’d come out on some stranger’s talk show?

“Just haven’t found the right person yet,” he smiles, calling to bear all his acting skills to avoid rolling his eyes right out of his head. Even that doesn’t satiate the host, though, and when he speaks again, he’s careful to be more clear: “When the right girl comes along, I’ll know it.”

A lie, of course; it’s been a lie every time he’s said it for the last twenty years.

Because the truth is far more boring than Loki Odinson having a hidden secret: Loki _has_ met the right girl. And at this moment, she’s across the ocean in London, filming some legal thriller, blissfully unaware that her dear friend and fellow former child actor Loki Odinson has been head over heels for her since they starred together in a kids’ show called _Learning Quest_.

“Really?” the host asks. “Handsome, talented guy like you? Not dating anyone?”

He shrugs. “It’s a very boring answer,” he says, “but the truth—” _Ha!_ “—is that there’s no one special in my life right now.”

“Well, best of luck to you,” the host says, graciously enough, “on the dating scene, and with _City (Comma) State_ , which comes out this Friday!” She turns back to the studio audience. “That’s it for Loki Odinson! Coming up next, the Punch Brothers perform a song from their new album! You don’t want to miss it!”

. . . . . .

Across the ocean, in a London hotel room, her lap covered with the pages she’s trying to learn for filming tomorrow, Sif Tyrsdottir turns off her TV and droops in disappointment.

. . . . . .


	2. Time Travel

. . . . . .

Sif and Loki are both at Cannes this year, so they carve time out of their schedules to meet and spend time together, as has been their habit for over a decade now, any time they’re in the same city. Thor, of course, is included in this, but Thor, of course, doesn’t do the sorts of movies that are shown at Cannes, and is currently vacationing in Australia.

Loki doesn’t much mind keeping this get-together down to just him and Sif. He loves Thor, really, just in a way that means he doesn't need to see him that often.

“That,” she informs him as his meal arrives, “looks disgusting.”

He quirks an eyebrow at her. “Bouillabaisse is a French classic.”

“It’s got shells in it,” she says. “Massive clam shells.”

“I believe they’re mussels,” he corrects her. “And I will never understand how you hate seafood so much when you grew up on the coast.”

“Oh, it’s easy,” she says, and leans forward as though about to impart a great secret. “It’s because seafood is grody.”

Loki snorts indelicately. “Is it ‘grody to the max’?”

“To the absolute max,” she confirms solemnly.

“Seafood is delicious," he says innocently. "If you dislike it, I can only assume you’ve never tried it properly,” he says, and scoops up one of the mussels in his spoon and acts like he’s going to dump it on her salad. “You’d better eat one.”

She shoots him a dirty look, and when that doesn’t quell him, kicks his shin under the table. Loki fights back a grin and pretends it didn’t hurt. Which it did, of course; Sif has always been insanely strong.

He doesn’t know what it is about Sif (yes he does), but she’s the only one who can get him to relax and act like a kid again. Maybe it’s because she’s so good at doing it herself. Most of her fans would be shocked to hear this—she always exudes this intense focus and quiet dignity in her roles and her media appearances—but she also has a very fun side that only those close to her get to see.

And around Loki, that sometimes manifests itself as them reverting to childhood. It’s not surprising, though, given that, outside his family, he’s known Sif longer than anyone else in his life.

“Your loss,” he says, and returns the mussel to his dish.

. . . . . .

Loki remembers well the first time he met Sif Tyrsdottir, at a playdate at his family’s Los Angeles home when he was six. Frigga had announced one Saturday that her friend Tyr, from work, was going to bring his daughter Sif over to meet Thor and Loki. Odin hadn’t seemed entirely pleased about the whole thing, and had shut himself up in his office, so he wasn’t present when Tyr showed up with a little girl in tow. 

(Thor and Loki, by this point, were fairly well versed in the film industry—unavoidable, really, when your father is a movie star and your mother a movie producer. They’d visited sets and production offices many a time, traveled the world to attend premieres with their parents, and each done a guest spot or two when someone needed a young child in a scene. But neither had ever properly acted before, so it’s only years later that it occurs to Loki that the playdate that Saturday was basically a preliminary screen test.)

The girl was Loki’s age, with pale skin and dark hair. He didn’t know what to say to her, but Thor never had that problem. 

“I’m Thor!” he announced. “What’s your name?”

She flashed them a gap-toothed grin. “Sif!”

“And this is Loki.” Thor gestured. “Want to play?”

Sif was immediately enthusiastic. “What game?”

“Knights! Me and Loki can come rescue you.”

At this, Sif’s expression turned stubborn. “I want to go on the quest too,” she insisted.

And so it was that Loki’s teddy bear had become the princess in need of rescuing, and the three children all went questing together. Sif and Thor picked up pool noodles to be swords, and Loki, left weaponless, became a wizard. With Loki’s creative mind, and Thor’s willingness to follow his brother’s stories, the quest became epic, ranging all over the yard and in and out of the massive garage.

And when the teddy bear was rescued, Loki looked back at the adults to see them both watching the children with very thoughtful, very pleased looks on their faces.

And so _Learning Quest_ was born.

The show ran for five years in the mid-1990s and became wildly popular, stopping only when the kids got too old to believably pull it off any longer. Thor, Sif and Loki went on an imaginary quest every episode, battling dragons and trolls and rescuing their stuffed toys; in the process, they found themselves facing obstacles that required them to answer math or geography or science questions, or to solve puzzles and riddles.

Thor was the leader of the group, a knight who was never afraid of the darkest forest or the fiercest monster. Sif was what Loki would now call the token female, chosen not for her talent (which she has in spades) but to appeal to a wider demographic—although he has to admit that for a kids’ show of that period to have a girl cast as a fierce warrior was (depressingly) fairly progressive at the time. And Loki was the wizard, whose magic staff could conveniently perform whatever spell was needed to get past various obstacles.

It was a sincere and decently well made little show, and Loki tries not to be too embarrassed when it's brought up now, although it's hard when he sees that clip of him in that stupid wizard's hat saying "I'm astounded!" being used as a reaction gif online. They later learned that Odin had been against the idea from the start—apparently he thought cheesy kids’ programming was beneath his sons—but Frigga talked him around by pointing out that it was educational and therefore valuable.

And it _was_ valuable in that it taught all three of them the basics of the industry, and in that it got them well known enough that by the time the show ended, all three quickly landed their first proper gigs: Thor playing Jamie Lee Curtis’s son in a disaster flick, Sif playing the youngest daughter in what would become a critically acclaimed sitcom, and Loki playing a troubled child in the cult classic indie film _Burning Reno_.

And their careers have pretty well followed those trajectories ever since. Thor is a wildly successful action comedy star, appearing in the sorts of movies where he saves the world, often while shirtless, and then gets the girl. Sif has done steady high-brow TV work and the occasional film, and was recently nominated for an Emmy for a guest spot she did on _Homeland._

Loki’s career path has been a little more . . . circuitous. Which he doesn’t mind, truly, because he’s choosing projects he’s passionate about, rather than those that guarantee fame and fortune, and he’s proud of the work he’s done. (And, though, this wasn’t intentional, he’s built up quite the little cult following of fans who love his quirky body of work.)

He’s proud of his life, and he never envies Thor, or anything he has.

. . . . . .

(Yes, obviously that’s a lie, but it makes him feel better to believe it, okay?)

. . . . . .

Loki was seven when _Learning Quest_ began and twelve when it ended, so, given his young age, perhaps it’s not surprising that he didn’t develop his massive crush on Sif until the wrap party.

Or rather, he suspects that perhaps he’d always cared for her, but only noticed it that night at the party, when she came to give him a massive hug and a kiss on the cheek. It didn’t mean anything—she’d picked it up from the adults around them always greeting each other with kisses—but he’d stood shell-shocked for ages after she walked away, and that’s when it really, truly occurred to him that he wasn’t going to see Sif nearly every day, wasn’t going to be on set with Sif nearly every day, and the thought of it was almost unbearably painful.

He spent the next three months trying to figure out how to ask his parents if he could see Sif again without betraying the fact that he’d been thinking about her constantly and that those thoughts always let loose a swarm of butterflies in his stomach. But fortunately for him, he didn’t have to ask in the end.

It was Thor who mentioned to Odin and Frigga how weird it was not seeing Sif all the time, because Thor has never been afraid of giving too much of himself away. (In his less charitable moments, Loki supposes he’s not worried about giving away his secrets because he’s too simple to have any secrets).

Frigga had agreed and quickly called Tyr to set up a time for their families to get together, and it’s been that way ever since—dinner once a month, as long as everyone was in town, all through their adolescence, which eventually turned into seeing each other any time they end up in the same city.

After all, the three stars of _Learning Quest_ spent hour after hour, day after day, year after year, keeping each other company in plywood forests, wearing dorky costumes, and saying things like “Multiplication is just like magic!” And those are ties that cannot be broken.

. . . . . .

But staying close to Sif is a double-edged sword: he gets to keep her in his life, but he also has to confront, every time they’re together, the undeniable truth that they’re not together and they’re never going to be together and if he doesn’t get past this stupid infatuation eventually, he’s going to die alone.

And to add insult to injury, it’s Thor that stands between them. Not knowingly, of course—it’s Thor, he doesn’t do anything knowingly—but, well . . . well, how could Loki have ever expected Sif to notice him, when he’s always standing next to Thor?

That’s not speculation; Sif told him.

They were sixteen at the time. Thor had just appeared on the cover of _Tiger Beat_ magazine—it was the late 90s, and _Tiger Beat_ was still a pretty big deal—and had landed a modeling gig with Abercrombie & Fitch. He’d just reached the point where he couldn’t go to the mall without being mobbed by screaming girls.

Loki had just been to Sundance for the first time. The film he was in got a special jury award. No screaming girls mobbed him at the mall.

And one night after a family dinner at Tyr’s house, Sif cornered him on the balcony, blushing furiously, and asked if Thor had ever said anything about her.

He blinked, his heart sinking. “Said anything like . . .”

“Like, I mean, like . . . do you think he’d go out with me?”

And Loki’s little adolescent heart shattered, and he doesn’t think he’s ever quite found all the pieces.

Thor and Sif never did end up going out; Thor had started dating a teen model called Amora very soon after. But now that he knew to look for it, Loki could see the veiled longing in Sif’s eyes when she was around Thor. And he kept seeing it. For years. And when she finally did get in her first serious relationship, it was with an Australian model named Haldor who could easily be mistaken for Thor in a dim room.

So, as previously stated, how could Sif ever notice Loki, when Thor’s there attracting all the attention?

(For Pete's sake, Thor was _People_ 's Sexiest Man Alive in 2018. The best Loki usually gets is "weirdly hot" or "better looking than you'd think" or "like a less-funny Noel Fielding," from a weird corner of the Internet that thinks that Noel Fielding is hot.)

Which is why he’s definitely lying when he tells himself that he doesn’t envy anything that Thor has. Because Thor doesn’t even want Sif, but he has her anyway.

Maybe someday Loki will stop caring. Maybe someday it’ll stop mattering to him so much.

Today is not that day.

. . . . . .

“Loki?” says Sif, and Loki nearly jumps out of his chair, and realizes he’s been staring moodily at his bouillabaisse. “You okay? You were a million miles away for a minute there.”

“Fine,” he says, just a fraction of a second too late for it to be completely convincing. “Just . . . thinking.”

Her brows furrow a little; her eyes are warm. “About anything in particular?”

“It’s nothing,” he says with forced cheer.

Sif tilts her head, just a fraction; for an instant there’s an expression on her face that he’s not sure what to make of. She sits up straighter and opens her mouth and draws breath as if to speak.

And then she hesitates, and then she gives him a closed-lipped smile and says, “Well, you know I’m here if you ever need to talk to me.”

Two decades in front of the camera make it easy for him to reach into his bag of facial expressions and find a carefree smile to show her. “Really, Sif. It’s nothing.”

It’s nothing.

It’s always nothing.

. . . . . .


	3. Scars

. . . . . .

Loki finds out from TMZ, of all places.

His manager Jeff sees it first. Loki has known Jeff for many years, and wishes he knew how to be as unabashedly weird but still wildly charismatic as the older man is. The guy wears eyeliner and stripes of blue lipstick and outlandish clothing, and he introduces himself to strangers as “the Grandmaster,” and people still just fall over themselves to be near him. Loki wears all black and people side-eye him so hard he worries they’re going to sprain something.

Anyway, Jeff sees the article, and it’s a testament to how close these two are, how well they’ve come to know each other over the years, that he reads the headline, and instead of tossing it aside like all the other drivel that’s been printed about Loki over the years, he sees something in it that makes him calls his client instead.

And Loki opens the link Jeff sent, and skims the article:

_LOKI ODINSON ADOPTED?_

_Indie film darling Loki Odinson is part of one of the most powerful families in Hollywood, which includes superstars Thor Odinson and Odin Burrson. But an intrepid reporter has dug up evidence that Loki is in fact the child of Icelandic rockers Laufey Nalson and Fárbauti Eldingarsdottir, two rising stars who were tragically killed in a car accident in 1984 . . ._

_. . . Odin Burrson and his wife, film producer Frigga Fjörgynnsdóttir, were filming the thriller_ Icebreaker _in Reykjavik in 1984 . . . Nalson and Eldingarsdottir served as music consultants on the film . . ._

_. . . could this explain why Loki Odinson doesn’t resemble anyone else in the family . . ._

_. . . always kept so hushed up? Was the family trying to hide . . ._

And Loki turns away from his phone with his heart in his throat and his stomach at his feet. It doesn’t even occur to him to doubt it, because all he can think is, _That would explain a lot._

He’s on the next flight to LA, and by the time he’s landed, the story is everywhere. He manages to get to his parents’ house without being noticed or accosted by the press, and Frigga and Odin, to their credit, come clean immediately.

“We’ve never lied about it,” says Odin. “It’s just that no one ever thought to ask. Including you.”

“We felt so terrible about the accident,” says Frigga sadly. “Fárbauti had become such a dear friend to me over the course of filming; she told me so many of her hopes and dreams for you. After the accident, she survived just long enough to give birth. She only got to hold you for a moment.”

Loki’s heart softens. “Why didn’t you tell me?” he asks.

It’s Odin who answers, and in true Odin style, quickly destroys all of Loki’s goodwill. “We didn’t see the need. And we didn’t want it to get to the press. The party they were coming home from—where Laufey was drunk was to the gills—was thrown by the production company. Would have been very bad publicity.”

Frigga winces.

And Loki can only stare at the man he calls father. “You kept this massive secret from me all my life because you were worried about how it would affect public perception? Of a _movie_?”

Odin winces a little now too. “I mean—not exactly—”

“This is my life!” Loki shouts angrily. “Did you ever think about how I’d feel to find out at the same time as the rest of the Internet? On TMZ?”

And now Odin looks angry. “You watch your tone, young man.”

“Oh yeah,” comes Loki’s withering retort. “It’s my tone that’s the problem here.”

“We took you in,” says Odin. “We looked after you. Loved you. Gave you every opportunity in the world. Don’t make us out to be the bad guys.”

“Loki, sweetheart—” says Frigga placatingly.

But Loki backs away, shaking his head. He needs time to sort through this—time when Odin is far, far away. On other side of the world, preferably.

. . . . . .

By the time Loki’s getting ready to board his plane at LAX, the story has been updated with a statement from the family: _We have never attempted to hide the fact that our son Loki is adopted. However, respecting his privacy, we have not broadcast this information—_

And Loki turns his phone off in disgust.

When he turns it on again in the Hanoi airport, he has a massive pile of missed calls and texts: mostly from Thor and Frigga, some from Jeff, one from Odin, and one from Sif.

And one text from Fandral, which is the only one he looks at, as it’s got the info for the house that Loki’s borrowing from him. Fandral, like so many people in Loki’s life, was Thor’s friend first—they appeared together in some moronic film about frat boys—but he’s always been kind to Loki, and over the years they’ve become very close. Close enough that Loki had no qualms about asking Fandral if he could stay in his beach house in Vietnam; close enough that Fandral had said yes immediately, no questions asked.

It’s to this beach house that Loki goes now. Fandral had clearly sent word ahead to have it be readied: the security guard at the gate waves him through without question, and he’s greeted by a smiling housekeeper, who indicates that the whole house has been cleaned and she’s taken the liberty of stocking the pantry and fridge.

Loki has now been traveling for 28 straight hours. He thanks the housekeeper, finds the master suite, faceplants on the massive bed, and sleeps.

. . . . . .

After a week, Loki finally gives in and starts taking Jeff’s calls. His manager scolds him for making everyone worry, informs him that the news story has pretty much entirely blown over, and arranges to send him a few scripts to read. Luckily Loki had been planning on taking a break anyway, as he’s between projects and a little tired out, so he’s got time to hide out in this far-flung corner of the world for a while.

And hide he does. He turns off his phone, reads scripts, reads books, works out, lays in the sun, works on his laptop while avoiding any news sites, and drinks local beers on the expansive patio as dusk deepens to night. Linh, the enormously helpful housekeeper, keeps the place clean and stocked with food and helps him locate a local restaurant that delivers.

And a month passes.

Besides Linh, the only person he talks to in that time is Hela, because he knows he can trust her not to take Odin’s side. Hela is the child of Odin’s first marriage, a short-lived affair in the 1970s that ended so acrimoniously that Hela’s mother took her to Switzerland and never set foot in the USA again. Hela didn’t find out who her father was until ten years ago—her mother finally told her on her deathbed—and by then the damage was done; she’s always resented the man who never even attempted to contact her and who made her mother so unhappy.

And she had absolutely no interest in meeting Odin’s new family . . . until she realized that one of them was Loki Odinson, who starred in _La Balancelle_ , a French-American collaboration that happens to be her favorite film. So Loki’s the only member of the family who has any kind of relationship with her. And when he receives an email commanding him to answer his phone, he fights back a smile and turns it on.

“I heard,” she says with no preamble when he answers her call. “Just now; I’ve been busy in Japan these last two weeks. How are you doing?”

“It’s nothing that a lot of beer and no contact with the outside world can’t fix,” he says wryly.

“Sounds fun,” says Hela. “Or a surefire recipe for alcoholism. Maybe both.”

Loki wonders how the scariest woman he knows is so good at making him smile. “It’s just . . . I keep thinking, is this why he’s always been so disappointed in me?” He hesitates. “You know that he’s never told me he’s proud of me? Not that I can remember.”

“Which is moronic,” says Hela. “You’re a much better actor than that idiot son of his.”

He snorts. “Thank you. I’m glad someone thinks so.”

“Listen,” says Hela seriously, “I can destroy him for you. If you want. A few words in the right ears . . .”

And the thing is, he believes that she could and she would. Hela is the VP of some high-powered Swiss bank that controls some absurdly large chunk of the world’s money; he knows that Odin has accounts there.

“I appreciate the offer, but I think I’m good.”

“Are you sure?” she asks. “It’d be no trouble. I was thinking of doing it anyway.”

“Tempting,” he says, “but I wouldn’t want to cause trouble for Mo—for Frigga.”

“I suppose Frigga is the least terrible of the three,” admits Hela begrudgingly.

“But seriously,” says Loki, “thanks for the offer.” He hesitates, and then he smiles a little. “You know,” he says, “I used to wonder about this—wonder why I was nothing like the rest of the family in appearance or personality. And when I met you, I actually took that as evidence that . . . I did belong. That I got the coloring and the personality from Odin’s side, and that you got the same genes.”

“Don’t get sentimental,” snorts Hela. But then she is quiet a moment. “But hey, kid, no matter who you are or aren’t related to, you’ll always have me.”

He can’t help smiling. “Thanks.”

“Don’t be too grateful. I’m only nice to you to get movie premiere tickets.”

“And I’m only nice to you so that you’ll look kindly on me when your bank takes over the world.”

Amusement colors her voice. “When I enslave the human race, I’ll let you be my butler.”

He grins. “Looking forward to it.”

. . . . . .

Loki lives in his self-imposed exile for one month, seeing only Linh, the security guard, the groundskeeper, and the kid from the restaurant who delivers his food. On the thirty-first day, in the evening, just as Loki is finishing his dinner, he gets a call from the front gate. “You have a visitor,” says the guard. “It’s an American woman. She says she’s friends with you.”

Loki’s brows furrow . . . and then they lift high, his stomach twisting in a mix of hope and fear. “Put her on screen.”

It’s Sif, looking beyond stunning in an enormous pair of sunglasses and a Panama hat. “Hey,” she says with a grin when she sees him, “is your brooding a solo activity or are you allowing visitors?”

Loki hesitates. And then he smiles a little. “Let her in.”

Linh is at the house then, fortunately, and she has Sif settled into one of the house’s many guest rooms and supplied with a sandwich in a flash. Then she leaves for the night, and Loki and Sif are alone.

As Sif finishes her sandwich, she and Loki make small talk about the house and about the project that’s brought her to southeast Asia (she starts filming in Bangkok in three days) and about how she texted Fandral repeatedly until he admitted where Loki was staying. So it’s not until she’s done with her meal and they’re settled on the porch with a couple of beers, the light slowly fading from the sky, that she turns to him with a serious look on her face.

“Talk to me, Loki.”

He shifts uncomfortably. “There’s nothing to say.”

She pierces him with a quelling look. “There’s everything to say. Do you know how worried everyone’s been? Your family? Your friends? Me?”

“I’m sure they weren’t really—”

“I was there and I’m telling you they were.” She fixes him with that look that, he sometimes feels, sees far too much. “You have people who care about you, Loki.”

He brings his bottle to his lips to avoid having to respond.

“So talk to me,” she repeats. “Is it being adopted? Because that’s not shameful.”

He shakes his head, and, seeing that she’s not going to give up on this, looks down at the table and thinks of how to answer. “It’s not being adopted,” he says finally. “It’s that they kept this hidden from me to avoid a scandal. No, it’s worse than that; they did it to keep a scandal from ruining a move that was released thirty years ago.”

Her expression is sympathetic and warm, and it gives him the courage to press on. “And—” He looks away from her, out over the ocean stretching out before them. “And I just keep wondering, is that what Odin was thinking about every time I did something he didn’t like, picked a role he wouldn’t have picked, wore something he wouldn’t have worn? Was he sitting there thinking ‘That’s because of his other parents; that’s because he’s not really my son’? Was he sorry he took me in? Would I have embarrassed him less if I’d been his real son?”

There it is, the deepest, darkest fears of the last month, out on display, and he is on tenterhooks waiting for her response.

But when it does come, it’s not at all what he expects: she reaches out, takes his hand where it rests on the table, and squeezes it gently before releasing it.

And he suddenly wishes more than anything that he’d not done such a good job of convincing people he doesn’t like to be touched much.

“I don’t know what to tell you,” she says. “I agree; what your parents did sucked. But they love you. And more than that, Thor loves you, and he had nothing to do with this; he didn’t know either. Don’t hurt him to punish them.”

Of course she’s defending Thor, he thinks with a resigned sigh. “He didn’t know,” he agrees in a voice that is not as strong as he’d like. “But he did benefit from being Father’s favorite.”

Sif lets out a little sigh, and stands from her chair. As she passes Loki’s she bends down and gives him a brief hug, then nods toward the large and comfy-looking outdoor sofa at the edge of the patio. “Come on, I want to get comfortable.”

He follows her gladly, as he will always follow her. She sits down, and he has a brief but fierce debate about whether he should sit on the cushion next to her or leave space between them. In the end he sort of splits the difference and ends up half a cushion away, and immediately starts berating himself for not sitting closer when he had the chance.

“You’re not like Odin or Thor,” she says, looking seriously at him, her face faintly blue in the dusky light. “And maybe that’s because you’re not biologically related, and maybe it isn’t. But what I’m sure of is that it doesn’t make you less than them. It doesn’t make you a bad person. But pushing away people who care about you because you’re mad at your parents . . . I’m not going to say that it makes you a bad person, but it definitely doesn’t make you a great one.”

She quirks a grin at him, and he wants nothing more than to move close and taste that smile, to feel her in his arms . . . 

Although, at this point, honestly he’d be pleased just to hold her hand.

“Fair point,” he says quietly, and slumps forward, his elbows on his knees and his head hanging down.

After a moment, he feels a touch on his back: Sif, rubbing gently and comfortingly. Every nerve ending in his body is on fire, desperate to get closer, to feel more of her touch—

He has a fierce internal debate. And then, astonished at his own audacity, and not looking at her so he doesn’t lose his nerve, Loki tips himself to the side until he is sprawled across the sofa and his head is laying in Sif’s lap.

She says nothing about the change in position, but her hand travels from his shoulder to his head and she starts gently running her fingers through his hair. It’s the most wonderful thing he’s felt in ages, and all he wants to feel, ever again, as long as he lives. He briefly lifts the moratorium he’s set on hopeful thoughts about Sif and allows himself to imagine a world where this is just how is relationship with her is, where she will hold his head in her lap and run her fingers through his hair any time, not just when he’s in crisis.

“I’m glad you came,” he says softly.

“Me too.”

. . . . . .

Sif stays two nights in the guest bedroom; she and Loki spend the intervening day together, eating Vietnamese food and chatting and lifting weights and and helping each other run lines. On the second morning she leaves for Bangkok, and twelve hours later, Loki is boarding a flight for LAX.

He visits Odin and Frigga because he knows Sif would want him to. Frigga begins to weep and throws her arms around him when he shows up at their doorstep, and Odin looks at him with what is, for him, a very soft expression. “Welcome home, my boy,” he says, and that rubs Loki the wrong way.

“I didn’t come back for you,” he says, a little sharper than he intended. “Thor’s an injured party in all this, too. He didn’t know any more than I did.”

Frigga steps back, looking a little subdued, and Loki’s knotted heart softens, just a little. Frigga lied to him just as much as Odin did, but Frigga also supported every role Loki ever took, every decision he ever made. So for her, he unbends. “But I am aware that you two took me in and provided for me. I want you to know that I am . . . working on it. On all of this. On . . .” He gestures between himself and his parents. “On us.”

Frigga’s smile is gentle and a little sad. “We will be here for you, any time you need us,” she says.

And Odin gives him a little smile. “We love you,” he says, and then “I love you,” and Loki’s heart softens a little more.

“Thank you.”

The reunion with Thor is less fraught: his brother lights up like a Christmas tree when he opens his front door and sees Loki on the other side.

“You didn’t know, right?” Loki asks before Thor can say anything.

“No idea,” says Thor solemnly.

And Loki nods, and hesitates, and steps forward, his arms lifting awkwardly—he’s so bad at this—

Fortunately, Thor, a prolific hugger, knows exactly what to do. “Welcome back, little brother,” he says, his beefy arms tight around Loki.

And Loki can’t help but smile from inside the well-muscled hug. “Thank you, big brother.”

. . . . . .


	4. Powerless

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I should take a moment here to thank CallistoNicol, who was great for bouncing ideas off, and who came up with the the specifics of this story's major conflict, which you're going to start getting hints of in this chapter.

. . . . . .

“You’ll never guess,” says Thor, the second the waitress has headed off to get their drinks and is out of earshot.

His puppy-like excitement seems to include Sif too, somehow, and she also looks very pleased, and for a split second Loki fears they’re about to announce—

“If I’ll never guess, you should tell me,” he says, managing to keep his voice steady. 

“I got the part!” Thor exclaims.

Loki wracks his brain for a moment as relief crashes through him. “The superhero film? That’s great; you were really excited about that, right?”

Thor nods. “But that’s not all!” he declares. “Guess who my leading lady is?”

He looks at Sif and grins, and Sif looks at him and grins, and Loki says “Sif?”

“Can you believe it?” Thor laughs. “This is going to be amazing.”

“That’s great!” says Loki, after a pause that’s a little too long for his words to be believable.

Because during that pause, he is thinking about the superhero movies he’s seen, and he’s thinking about Thor Odinson movies he’s seen, and if the usual pattern shows through, Sif as his leading lady means . . . kissing. At the absolute least. And at the absolute most, possibilities he refuses to think of.

He’s being ridiculous about this, he knows. He’s an adult, and a professional actor; he knows perfectly well that anything that happens on-camera is just part of the job, it doesn’t mean anything, it’s not the same as kissing someone off-camera.

But his brain would clearly rather be a child about this right now. As Thor and Sif thank him for his congratulations, his brain insists on imagining increasingly elaborate scenarios in which Thor realizes how much he likes kissing his old friend, and Sif’s crush on Thor comes out of whatever corner of her heart she’s hidden it in, and one thing leads to another and suddenly Loki is best man at their wedding.

It takes a lot longer than he’d like to admit for him to get those images out of his head and his focus on the conversation.

“Sif, really, that’s great news,” he says, quite sincerely, because even if he hates this he can recognize why she wouldn’t. “That movie’s going to huge. This could be really good for your career.”

Sif smiles, pleased and rosy-cheeked. “Plus it’s going to be so fun. Thor and I together on set again? Just like old times!”

“Now we just have to get you there with us!” Thor declares. “I wonder if any parts aren’t cast yet.”

Loki forces himself to laugh lightly. “I appreciate the thought, but I’m swamped. And anyway, that kind of film, that’s not really my style.”

“I know,” says Thor, looking cast down. “But we really do need to find something all three of us can be in.”

“ _Learning Quest_ revival,” Sif suggests, her solemn tone betrayed by the amusement in her eyes.

“Perfect,” says Loki, willing to go along with the joke if it means changing the topic. “We’re grown now and instead of rescuing teddy bears, we have to finish expense reports. But we still have to solve math problems to complete the quest.”

Thor is shaking his head. “We were so dorky.”

“We were so cool,” Sif retorts, a statement that is confirmed when a thirty-something comes by their table.

“This is so rude of me,” she begins, and Loki braces himself for the inevitable fawning over Thor. But the woman surprises him. “You three were all in _Learning Quest_ , right? That was my favorite show when I was a kid. Could I get a picture?”

“See?” Sif says to Thor. “People love _Learning Quest_.” She turns to the woman. “Of course, that’d be fine.”

The woman gets her friend to take a picture of the four of them together; as she takes her phone back to check the photo, Loki sees the restaurant manager coming over, undoubtedly to politely tell her to take herself off and _stop_ bugging the _guests,_ this is a _high-end_ es _tab_ lishment . . .

She sees the manager then and turns back to the table with an embarrassed look on her face. “Gotta go. But!” She turns to Thor, and Loki can practically see the hearts in her eyes when she says, “Loved you in _Mesozoic Planet_.”

Thor is politely grateful, Sif gives the woman a courteous smile, and Loki thinks about the incident the rest of the night. That woman was a fan of the show, but when push came to shove, she only had parting words for Thor. Thor is first in everything: success, fame . . . and first of the brothers to kiss Sif Tyrsdottir. Even if it is just for a role.

He’s not great company that evening.

. . . . . .

That night Loki lays in his bed and stares at the ceiling for hours. His irrational fear from earlier has passed, and he just keeps thinking (and thinking and thinking) that in another life, where he’d made different choices, it could be him and Sif in that movie.

Because it’s not like he’s never had the opportunity. He’s never been up for a superhero role, but he gets approached about mainstream movies all the time—usually to play the quirky best friend or the scientist or the villain. So he could be in popular movies, if he wanted. He could star in blockbusters and gain hoards of screaming fans, if he wanted.

So the question is, does he want it?

Sometimes he wonders if he ever actually chose this life. Not acting in general, because while he did just get sucked into it as a child, at some point he started having to make an effort, started having to actively choose to do the things he does. But the career he’s built for himself, the type of movies and plays he chooses . . . he tells people, when they ask, that story about how working on _Burning Reno_ turned him on to more serious, artistic, often independent films. But in his heart of hearts, sometimes he wonders if that’s true.

Because sometimes he thinks back to when he was a teenager, when he started to realize what a different body of work he was building compared to Thor, and he saw how much everyone loved Thor. And he asked his mother to try to get him auditions for the type of movies Thor was doing.

Frigga, bless her, did so without comment. She found this teen movie about a kid who has to save his little brother and the neighbor kids when a tornado hits their town. Loki worked hard on this audition; he put his whole heart into it. And he thought—he still thinks—he nailed it.

The casting director thanked him very politely for coming in, and when she thought he was out of earshot, pulled Frigga aside and asked if she’d bring Thor in to read for the part.

Loki hasn’t tried for a similar role since.

So does it count as “choosing this sort of career” if deep down, his motive has always been, at least in part, to never go for a film that Thor might be interested in as well?

But on the other hand, no matter why it started, this is his life now, and he loves it. He’s come to love the sorts of movies he does; he loves the freedom of not being so entirely under a studio’s thumb; he loves that he can go to the grocery store without drawing a screaming crowd. He loves that he’s telling stories that wouldn’t be otherwise told, that he’s starting conversations that wouldn’t otherwise be had. It’s who he is now.

It just sucks that who he is seems to be someone who doesn’t catch Sif’s interest. It sucks that he has to choose between who he is and what he wants.

It sucks that no one is going to cast him as a superhero, with Sif as his leading lady.

He just feels—his lips twist in wry amusement at the terrible pun—powerless.

. . . . . .


	5. Soulmates

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to everyone who's read and reviewed so far! I needed some Twitter handles for this chapter, so I've borrowed some of the more frequent reviewers' names. ;)

. . . . . .

It starts with Loki’s cell phone.

Like many phones, it’s got that feature where it suggests news stories based on things he’s searched for in the past, and like many phones, it mostly does a terrible job of it. Loki largely ignores the feature, unless he’s bored and looking for something to occupy his mind, as he is now. He scrolls idly through, skimming the headlines, until one catches his eye in the worst way possible.

It’s from Buzzfeed. There’s a picture of Sif and Thor, sitting side by side and laughing. (Yes, he clicks on news stories about Sif often enough for his phone to have realized it’s an interest of his. Sue him.) The headline: _New romance for Thor Odinson?_ The blurb: _It looks like Thorsif is becoming a thing and we are #hereforit._

It’s so stupid. These websites will say anything for clicks, make something out of nothing just to have a news story, and he is not going to buy into it. He turns his phone off and puts it in his pocket.

And then he pulls it out again and pulls up the story.

_Thor Odinson and Sif Tyrsdottir play a star-crossed couple in next month’s_ Solar Flare. _But it looks like romance might be brewing off-set as well._

The facts are these: Sif and Thor have been making the rounds, doing interviews and public appearances to promote their new movie, and the Internet has decided to read something into it. The article has collected a whole slew of tweets commenting on the pair’s chemistry in these press appearances.

@bacner has posted a still from an interview, one where Thor is looking over at Sif, and added,  
_Get you someone who looks at you like Thor Odinson looks at Sif Tyrsdottir._

@murdur  
_umm have you guys seen this because these two are so cute together im going to dieeeee_

@a_ufo_party  
_I think I might ship these two more than I do their characters._

To which @arachyle replied,  
_Did you know they grew up together and used to be on a kids show? If they’re childhood sweethearts that’s the cutest thing I’ve ever heard._

@woodelf  
_These two beautiful people are so in love and it makes me want to cry._

That is the most ridiculous thing that Loki has ever heard. These idiots on Twitter are dead wrong.

But still, a morbid sort of curiosity overcomes him, and he plays the video.

Thor and Sif are sitting side by side, being interviewed, and Loki can actually maybe see where people would get the (completely erroneous) idea that they’re an item.

Because Thor and Sif actually look really good together, like perfect models in an Abercrombie & Fitch ad. Because they have this crazy chemistry together, and he knows it’s only because they’ve known each other for so long, but he can see how it would look from the outside. Because they keep shooting each other these fond looks. Because they finish each other’s sentences. Because at one point, Thor makes Sif laugh so hard that her glasses fall off, and people who are only familiar with the more serious side of Sif Tyrsdottir must be astounded at anyone who could make her laugh like that. Because Thor puts a friendly hand on Sif’s knee at one point, and Sif grabs that hand and squeezes it and smiles.

Still. Dating. They would have told him, right?

He turns off his phone and goes to the fridge to get himself a drink, and he makes it maybe thirty seconds before his phone is out again and he’s on his couch, pulling up YouTube. _Just one more,_ he tells himself as he loads the first video from their press junket, and then _Just one more,_ and _Just one more,_ until the evening is gone.

And when he reaches the end of the last interview, he can no longer ignore the knot of dread that’s been slowly growing in the pit of his stomach; he can no longer pretend that this all isn’t freaking him out. And he can’t help fearing that the top-rated comment on the last YouTube video is accurate:

SorceressSupreme  
_So we all agree that these two are soulmates, right?_

. . . . . .

Loki tries very hard to ignore what he’s seen, but Thorsif (yeah, they have a ship name, and it’s stupid) turns out to be something he can’t leave alone, like a mosquito bite he can’t help scratching. And any hopes he has that this is something that will be quickly discounted, or at least quickly forgotten about, vanish as the days go by.

Because Thorsif is the Internet’s new favorite thing. There are Tumblr blogs dedicated to it (Loki was only vaguely aware of what Tumblr even is before all this starts, and now he's checking it daily). People write whole articles about it. Somebody digs up old episodes of _Learning Quest_ and makes a whole bunch of gifs of Thor and Sif together. Somebody else makes a Tumblr blog dedicated to these gifs. Another person takes a still from one of these gifs, puts it next to a still from one of these interviews, and captions it _None of us ever had chance with Thor; Sif got there twenty years before the rest of us._ It has 12,000 notes on Tumblr.

Friends start calling Loki and asking him if it’s true, and he gets a lot of practice saying, in as neutral a tone as possible, “If it is, they haven’t said anything to me.”

What he does not do is put the question to Sif and Thor. Because if the answer is yes, he’s not sure he’ll be able to keep his feelings from his face. And the last thing he wants, if Thor and Sif are dating, is for either of them to realize how he feels.

So he doesn’t not reach out to Sif or Thor, and when Sif ends up in New York City, where he currently is, and calls to see if he wants to go to dinner, he makes some lame excuse about being too busy.

“Are you sure?” she asks, with surprise and doubt in her tone. And he knows why; even if they’re busy, they always make time for each other.

But he stands strong. “Really sorry,” he says. “But I’ll talk to you later, all right?” And he hangs up.

But if he thinks that was the end of it, he’s clearly forgetting that this is Sif he’s dealing with. The night after her call, he walks into his hotel and there she is, standing in the lobby, waiting for him. It’s a peculiar sensation, to feel so much pleasure and so much dread at the same time.

“Sif!” he says, calling all his years of training to the fore to keep his voice sounding normal. “Didn’t expect to see you here.”

She takes a step toward him. “I know you said you were busy, but . . . are you okay? On the phone you sounded kind of . . . off. So I just wanted to stop by and make sure you’re doing okay.”

He blinks in carefully curated surprise. “I’m fine,” he says, as though he can’t understand what would make her think that.

Sif seems to find his answer convincing (not for nothing does he have a wall full of special jury awards for acting), and looks confused. “You’re sure?”

“Absolutely sure,” he says. He wants the conversation to end, but he doesn’t want to be rude, so he says “And how are you doing?”

“Good,” she says, still looking a little confused and put off her game. “Just, uh, getting ready for the premiere of _Solar Flare_ next week. Are you going to be there?”

Does it make him a coward that he's pleased to be able to truthfully say, “I actually have a prior commitment that night; I’m judging a film festival in the UK”?

“Oh, I didn’t hear about that.”

“Yes, well, we haven’t talked in a while,” says Loki, wishing she would just go.

But she doesn’t leave, she just stands there, like she’s expecting something else out of the conversation.

Loki instructs himself firmly not to say anything he’ll regret.

And then he speaks anyway, because one of his charming quirks is that he tends to lash out when he feels uncomfortable or wrong-footed. “I hear I have to offer you and Thor congratulations,” he says insincerely. “Are we to expect wedding bells soon?”

Sif laughs and rolls her eyes. “Yeah, that’s been everywhere lately, hasn’t it? It’s so ridiculous.”

“Is it?” Loki can’t help but ask, his tone not entirely kind. “Is it ridiculous?”

Her brow furrows. “What are you saying?”

“Just curious,” he says, casually undermining his dearest friendship with a shrug, which is another charming quirk of his. “I always wondered when you two were finally going to hook up.”

“What?”

“Well, you used to be interested,” he points out—the first time they’ve spoken of it in more than fifteen years. “Besides, what’s not to like? Sexiest Man Alive, after all.”

“Yeah,” scoffs Sif, “because that’s all I look for in a guy. Whether _People_ has named him the sexiest man alive.”

“Oh, so you’re saying sexy and blonde isn’t your thing? I kind of figured it was. Given Thor, and the fact that Haldor was basically Thor with an Australian accent. It definitely seems like you have a type.”

“Really,” she says, her tone short and abrupt. “That’s what you think of me? You think I’m that shallow? That the only thing I’m looking in a guy for is whether the media agrees that they’re hot?”

“If the shoe fits,” Loki says, and then immediately regrets everything that has just happened, because Sif looks furious, and even he’s not such a social disaster as to not realize that he’s let his anger get the better of him.

“Well, you know what?” Sif says tightly. “Screw you, Loki.”

And she storms out of the hotel lobby. Loki stares after her, his heart shattering as it hasn’t done since that day when they were sixteen and she asked him if Thor would go out with her. He is sick with dread and regret.

He considers going after her to apologize, but apologies have never really been his strong suit. So he stands uncertainly for a few minutes, and then turns to trudge, shoulders slumped, to his hotel room.

. . . . . .


	6. Ties

. . . . . .

“Thank you for coming,” says Frigga warmly, and presses a kiss to his cheek.

“Happy to do it for you, Mother,” says Loki, which is an absolute lie.

The truth is that Frigga was clever, and he was careless, and in a moment of distraction, he’d foolishly answered “Nothing” when she’d asked “What are you doing Friday night?” Which meant that “I’m far too busy to come to your party, Mother" wasn’t going to fly.

Frigga: 1, Loki: 0, so he has dutifully showed up at her production company’s little soiree. He even plasters a smile on his face, something he’s been doing so much these past three weeks that he scarcely remembers what a real smile feels like.

But it seems to convince Frigga, which is good. The other reason he agreed to come to this party is that his mother has been worried about him lately, calling often, pressing gently every time, trying to get to the bottom of what is, even for him, a fairly black mood. And since obviously he can’t tell her the truth— _I’m afraid Sif and Thor are secretly in love with each other and I insulted Sif over it and now she won’t speak to me and everything is terrible—_ he has to come here and pretend to enjoy her party, to deflect her questions.

At least Sif isn’t here; part of him wishes she was, but most of him is glad she isn’t, because he doesn’t want to have to see her looking at him with that same anger she showed in the hotel lobby. If that is indeed what she would do. It’s been three weeks since their argument, and they haven’t spoken at all, and he’s trying to figure out what means.

In the normal way of things, they sometimes go far longer than that without speaking; they’re both busy people whose jobs take them all over the world. So maybe this is a normal silence; maybe she was irritated with him that night but not in a lasting way. But with the way things ended between them . . . he’s just honestly not sure whether they’re not talking because of their schedules or not talking because she’s furious with him.

It should be noted that she has every right to be furious with him. But he’s also unhappy with her right now too. It’s not reasonable of him, because she’s allowed to love who she loves, but he still just doesn’t know if he could talk to her with equanimity right now. He needs time to come to terms with it. And maybe that makes him a selfish person, but, well, here we are.

Of course he hasn’t actually gotten confirmation yet from Sif or Thor that they’re dating, mostly because he hasn’t wanted to talk to them for a while. But even if they claim they’re not, he can’t get rid of that feeling in the pit of his stomach that says that everyone watching them is right: they have a connection and a chemistry that is more meaningful than anything that Loki’s ever had with her, and that surely will eventually lead to a romantic connection between them.

So he’s spent the last three weeks preparing hard for an upcoming project and ignoring the Internet and ignoring his phone and ignoring the entire outside world. It’s the perfect solution to a problem, he thinks: don’t like reality? Then ignore it.

Frigga passes him off to some colleagues of hers and goes back to greet more guests, and he dutifully makes small talk for a while. He’s not as famous as Thor, but he’s definitely a name that Hollywood insiders know, and given his low mood right now, he has to admit that it’s gratifying to see how pleased these people are to speak with him.

He spends about an hour this way, circulating about the room and pretending that he’s not in a royal snit (he is), until he finds himself in a corner with a woman he’s never seen: about his age, long brown hair, dark eyes. Quite pretty, in a hot librarian way, but definitely not one of the glittering elite who fill the party; there’s something about her that screams that she doesn’t belong here, and maybe that’s why Loki doesn’t mind when she strikes up a conversation

“You’re Loki Odinson, right?”

He confirms that he is and waits for her to follow up with some comment about his being Thor’s brother. Instead she says, “I loved you in _City (Comma) State._ ”

He feels a pleased smile come to his lips. “You saw it?”

“I was at the premiere,” she says, then explains, “Darcy Lewis was my roommate in college.”

Now that is a topic he is very willing to discuss. “She’s great, isn’t she? We’ve actually been talking about working together again. Just looking for the right project.”

“Yeah, I saw her for lunch last week and she mentioned that.”

They chat for several happy minutes about what Darcy was like in college and what she’s like to work with on a movie set, and what a great director and screenwriter she is.

And finally Loki thinks to say, “I’ve been terribly rude; I never asked your name.”

“Jane Foster.”

It doesn’t ring any bells. “And what brings you to this party?”

Jane gives him a sweet little smile. “I actually worked on a movie for Frigg—for your mother, I guess. I’m an astrophysicist, and they wanted someone to make sure the science sounded right.”

“Oh, on _Particle Man_?”

 _Particle Man_ is Thor’s latest project, a biopic of some scientist or other—an attempt to be taken a little more seriously as an actor.

She nods. “It was actually Darcy who passed my information on to your mom. I’d never done anything like that before.”

“And how did you like the experience?”

To his surprise, her smile dims, just a little. She tries to hide it, but she’s not a professional actor.

“Is there a story there?” he asks, and then he grins. “Was my brother just too obnoxious to work with? I always suspected he’d be that way on a movie set.”

But to his further surprise, Jane wilts a little further. A little alarmed, he says, “I meant that as a joke. Did Thor do something?”

“No,” says Jane, and then “Kind of,” and then “Not anything terrible. Not anything that’s going to end up in a #metoo article.”

“That’s a relief, I guess,” he says. “Look, you don’t have to tell me—you hardly know me—but if you need a listening ear . . . I love my brother, but I know better than anyone that he can be an idiot sometimes.”

Jane fidgets for a moment, then takes a sip of champagne. “It’s . . .” And then she says all in a rush, “Do you think your brother could ever go for someone like me?”

Oh dear, has this scientist developed a crush? Loki is looking for a way to let her down easy when she adds, “He certainly acted like it. For a while. But . . .”

Thor showing interest in an astrophysicist? Thor showing interest in anyone who’s not a blonde model? “What did he do that made him seem interested?”

Jane looks a little embarrassed. “He asked me out. Actually we went out four times.”

Loki is not a jerk, or at least he’s only a jerk when he wants to be. So he carefully does not let any of his instinctive disbelief show through. Because Jane Foster is quite pretty, and an excellent conversationalist. But she’s really, really not Thor’s type. As in, there’s probably no part of her appearance that comes from a tanning bed, a bottle of peroxide, or a silicone implant.

“Yeah, I was really surprised at first,” Jane said. “I mean, he’s a movie star! But he kept flirting, and kept asking me out, so I finally went. And it was . . .” There’s a sweet smile on her face. “Really fun, We had a really good time. We hit it off so well.”

This is a whole new Thor, if he’s asking astrophysicists out. “Then what’s the problem?” he asks kindly, ready to encourage. Because he’d far rather have this woman be in Thor’s life than some of his old girlfriends.

Jane hesitates. “I don’t know if you saw,” she says, “any of that stuff on the Internet? With Sif Tyrsdottir?”

Loki’s mouth tightens into a thin line. “I saw.”

“Well, that came out right as he finished shooting and left the country for something. And I tried to tell myself that it wasn’t a big deal, that this was one of the normal rumors that’s always floating around about celebrities. But then I called him one day. I know!” she blushes in response to his raised eyebrows. “Calling celebrities is so not like me. But Darcy talked me into it. She’s like that. So I called yesterday. He sounded really distracted, and then he told me that he had to go because Sif was on the other line. And he hung up super quick.”

Loki’s hand tightens into a fist.

“I was an idiot to think he might be serious about me,” Jane sighs.

“He should be serious about you,” Loki says firmly. “You seem lovely. Not half so moronic as his usual girlfriends.”

“Thank you?” Jane says uncertainly.

And that’s when they’re interrupted by a booming voice. “Jane!”

They look over and there’s the man himself, Thor Odinson, entering the room with a massive grin on his face.

“I thought he wasn’t coming,” Jane mutters to Loki.

“I thought so too,” says Loki. “Mother told me he was out of town and wouldn’t be back until tomorrow.”

Thor makes his way over to them, beaming at them both. “Loki!” he calls when he’s still some distance away, causing several people to glance over in surprise. “So glad you’re here! And Jane! It feels like it’s been forever! I ended up coming back early and I wasn’t sure if I wanted to come or not, but then Mother said that you were coming.”

“Okay,” Jane says slowly.

Thor looks a little baffled by her lack of enthusiasm, but he still steps forward and leans in as though to kiss her cheek.

She backs up. “What are you doing?” she demands, and if Loki liked Jane before, he loves her now, as it’s because of her that he now knows what it’s like to see Thor get rejected by a woman. Turns out the answer is “Very satisfying.”

Thor looks surprised and a little hurt; he glances at Loki, and then at Jane. “I . . . I’m sorry, is something wrong?”

Jane stares at him, then also glances at Loki. It occurs to him that maybe they’d prefer not to have this conversation in front of him, but he has no intention of leaving; he is enjoying this immensely. “What’s wrong is that you didn’t so much as shoot me a text for two weeks, and when I called you acted like you couldn’t get off the phone fast enough. I thought it was a sign that . . . _whatever_ this was is over.”

“No!” says Thor, sounding alarmed. “I don’t want it to be over. I’m really sorry about the radio silence; I was insanely busy, and then the cell reception in Malawi was a lot worse than I expected.”

“Well, what about the thing with Sif Tyrsdottir, then?” she asks, uncomfortably tucking a piece of hair behind her ear. “Everyone on the planet is convinced you’re dating, and I try to ignore it, but then when I try to talk to you, you blow me off to talk to her instead.”

“Sif? I’m not dating Sif,” Thor says, looking as though Jane has just claimed to believe that the Hollywood sign was put there by aliens. “I’ve never dated Sif. I love her like a sister and that’s it. And she feels the same way about me.” He pauses. “Except as a brother.”

All the tension that Loki didn’t even notice was in his spine dissipates very suddenly.

Jane looks surprised and pleased and still a little doubting. “Really? Then why, when I called you . . .”

“She’s one of my very best friends,” Thor says. “I was talking her through a crisis.” He gestures at Loki. “Caused by this idiot here.”

Loki stands up straighter. “Me?”

“Yeah, and we need to talk about that,” Thor says, rounding on him angrily. “Where do you get off talking to Sif that way?”

“What—I didn’t—what did she say?”

“She’d been really weird for a while,” Thor said. “Dodging my calls, or keeping it really short if I did manage to get her on the phone. But I finally convinced her to talk to me yesterday.” He looks at Jane. “That’s when you called.” He looks back at Loki. “And she told me you guys had a massive fight when you told her she was shallow and only interested in how men look. What the heck, bro? Even if that were true—which it’s obviously not—why would you ever say that to her? She was really upset about it.”

And now Jane is looking disapprovingly at him too, and Loki puts up his hands in a placating gesture. “I didn’t mean it,” he insists. “I was having a really bad day and she showed up unexpectedly at my hotel, and we started arguing. And I said a bunch of stuff I really regret.”

“Have you told her that?” Thor demands, in the tone of someone who already knows the answer.

Loki scowls at him. “I prefer you when you’re playing dumb for the camera.”

“Which is your way of saying you know I’m right.”

Loki crosses his arms over his chest. “I would love not to have this conversation,” he says flatly.

“Why were you and Sif even arguing?” says Thor. “You guys are, like besties. Like weirdly close.” He reaches out unconsciously and puts his arm around Jane; she goes very willingly to his side, and watching the show of affection makes Loki's heart hurt.

Maybe that’s why he answers humbly. “Just me being an idiot,” he says quietly.

But Thor wants more than that. “It must have been pretty bad for you to yell at her. And to tell her that she only goes for guys who look like me. What was _that_ about?”

“You have to admit, Haldor looked a lot like you,” Loki says defensively.

Thor looks surprised, like the thought has never occurred to him. “Why were you talking about that?”

Perhaps a partial answer will get his brother to leave him alone. “It came up because we were talking about this whole you-and-Sif rumor.”

This turns out to be a tactical error, because Thor makes the connection that Loki had been confident he never would. “Is that what you were mad about? The rumors about me and Sif dating?”

His brow stays furrowed a moment, but Jane gets a very thoughtful look on her face, and looks up at Loki. And maybe her smarts get absorbed through osmosis, because after a moment, Thor seems to see it too.

“Dude, were you jealous?” he asks.

“No,” Loki retorts reflexively.

“Oh my gosh,” says Thor. “You were jealous at the thought of me dating Sif. Are you into her?” Beside him, Jane looks absolutely fascinated at the twist the conversation has taken.

It’s on the tip of Loki’s tongue to say no again, to convince Thor with his calm, measured answer that he feels absolutely nothing for Sif.

But then he stops. Because he’s seen a movie or two in his time, and he knows how this goes; he insists he feels nothing for Sif, and it gets back to Sif, and it just causes more misunderstanding and heartbreak down the line.

He hesitates, and opens his mouth, and hesitates, and shuts it again.

Apparently that’s answer enough for Thor. “You and Sif? Really?” he asks, and Loki braces himself for the inevitable mocking. Instead he gets, “I think that’s the best idea you’ve ever had.”

Loki blinks.

“I mean it,” says Thor. “Sif is about as good as they get. Present company excluded.” He presses a kiss to Jane’s cheek, and she smiles. “You couldn’t do better. And you guys have all this history together . . .”

“It doesn’t matter what kind of history we have together,” Loki says with dignity, “since she has never shown the tiniest bit of interest in me.”

“She’s never said anything to me about it,” Thor agrees. “But on the other hand, she puts up with your moodiness, and your theatrics, and your food snobbery, and the way you scold people who use text speak.”

“It’s uncivilized,” Loki says testily.

Thor ignores him. “And she was really upset about your fight. Like, more than I've seen her be about fighting with other people.”

Loki’s heart sort of sinks and lifts and the same time. “Was she? I hoped maybe . . . crap.”

He’d have thought he’d be humiliated and unhappy to have his deepest secret out in the open, but it’s not as bad as he thought it’d be, probably because Thor is being unexpectedly encouraging, and Jane, though she has no context for this conversation, is smiling quiet support at Loki as well.

Could Sif truly not hate him? Could Sif even . . . care for him?

It's impossible. It's foolish and naive to believe such a fairy tale. And yet, if there's even a possibility that it's true . . .

Loki looks around the room, his mind whirling, then prepares to do something he never thought he’d do: ask Thor for help. “What do I do?” he asks quietly.

“You call her,” Thor says firmly. “Or better, you go visit her.”

And Loki is tempted. Especially now that Thor’s planted the idea in his mind that there’s a tiny chance that she won’t be thoroughly disgusted at the thought of him having feelings for her.

“She’s in . . . Sweden this week? Norway,” Thor corrects himself. “Filming that Viking thing. There’s a red eye to Oslo, I happen to know.”

That’s insane. And yet, Loki can’t help but consider it. “Is this crazy?” he says.

Jane breaks in. “It does sound like at the very least you owe her an apology.” Yeah, okay, she's got a point.

“And who knows?” Thor adds. “Maybe it’ll go even better than that.”

Loki stands stock-still, thoughts racing through his mind, and then he looks at Jane.

“I think you should go,” she says. “But you should know, I watch Hallmark Christmas movies all year round, so I might be a little biased toward romantic gestures.”

He looks at Thor.

“Go, Loki,” says Thor. “Don’t think.”

“She must hate me,” Loki says softly.

“She’ll get over it,” Thor reassures him. “We all do.”

Loki looks from Thor to Jane then back again, and then a slow smile spreads across his face. He pulls Thor into a quick hug, and presses a kiss to Jane’s cheek, then runs from the room.

. . . . . .

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Those of you with impeccable taste in movies may recognizes lines borrowed from the 1995 Sabrina.
> 
> I don't know if I'll have day 7 up on Saturday; I'm on vacation and I don't know how much time I'll have. But know that if it's not up on Saturday, it will be up ASAP.


	7. AU

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I'm a few days late, but finally I am done! Thank you guys all for your great comments, and thanks to the organizers of Sifki Week; it's been so much fun!
> 
> A note for later: in case you’re racking your brain, trying to remember if you’re supposed to know who James Falsworth is, he’s the Howling Commando in Captain America who is played by JJ Feild. JJ Feild looks an awful lot like Tom Hiddleston. That’s it, that’s the whole joke.

. . . . . .

Turns out Loki was right when he thought doing _Solar Flare_ could be a major boost to Sif’s career: before the movie was even released, she got an offer to be in some major fantasy Viking epic with a bunch of big names. And she’s one of the leads, playing a fierce shieldmaiden who, along with a group of three male Viking warriors, has to save her kingdom from dark elves. It’s a joint American-Norwegian production, being filmed in Norway with a Norwegian director, and two of the three male warriors are Norwegian stars.

Fortunately for Loki, Fandral is playing the third warrior, and he’s happy to let Loki know that Sif is on set today, and tell him where they’re filming, and to arrange for him to meet with the director, Erik Selvig, to get the okay to come on set.

Unfortunately, Selvig is what a kind person might call quirky and particular, and what Loki calls an uptight nutjob; he is notorious for not allowing outsiders on set, worried about spies and leaks and spoilers. And he is in the middle of lecturing Loki on why it is vital to keep the set closed when a harried-looking woman carrying a tablet hurries over.

“I’ve just heard from James Falsworth’s people,” she says, apparently deciding this is more important than Selvig’s current conversation. “The doctors confirm he broke his leg. He’s out.”

“I knew it,” Selvig groans. “Idiot. He came all the way over here, and breaks his leg tripping over a curb outside his hotel.”

She nods. “So do we reschedule that scene?”

Selvig frowns. “We’re ready today, and the leg won’t be healed for months.” A pause. “Really, it’s basically a cameo; James was doing it as a favor to me. In theory, we could grab someone else with the same build—”

And that’s when his gaze falls on Loki. “You know,” he says thoughtfully, “you look an awful lot like James Falsworth, just with darker hair.”

Loki blinks. “So I’ve been told.”

“And you’re the same build.”

Loki says nothing, because he can’t decide whether he wants to encourage this train of thought.

“And I loved you in _La Balancelle_.”

“Thank you,” says Loki politely. “That’s my sister’s favorite.”

And Selvig seems to make a decision. “All right,” he says, “I’ll make you a deal. You want to talk to your friend? Do this cameo and I’ll let you on set.”

A cameo in a summer blockbuster about magical vikings is not exactly Loki’s style. But on the other hand, he knows they’re shooting today until well into the night, and if he has to wait eight hours until Sif’s done for the day, he’s going to lose his nerve and/or drive himself to distraction thinking about it.

“Fine,” he says tightly. “What do you need me to do?”

And so Loki Odinson finds himself making a cameo as an evil wizard on _The Realm Eternal._

Luckily, there’s minimal hair and makeup—they think his hair is perfect as is—and the costume needs no alterations; turns out he really is the exact same size as James Falsworth. It’s an affair of green and black leather that, despite having little historical accuracy, isn’t so bad. What is bad is the absurd headgear they’re making him wear: a sort of helmet with massive gold horns protruding from the forehead and sweeping up and around to the back of his head, like a gold-plated ibex. Loki grits his teeth and reminds himself, _for Sif._

Not that he’s even seen her yet. The set is massive; Selvig believes in practical effects and elaborate set design, so he’s constructed a whole Viking village, and some of the grounds of the massive golden palace that will apparently be added in post, all set in the most gorgeous countryside in central Norway. And the surrounding trailers and canopies and outbuildings are the size of another village, and Loki just doesn’t know where Sif is in the midst of this massive sprawl.

But he’s given a chance to find out. The woman with the tablet hands him some lines to learn, and tells him they’ll be ready for him in a half hour. Clearly she thinks he’ll need that long to learn those lines, but there’s only four of them, and he has them learned before she’s out of sight.

And then he looks around. No one is looking at him; no one will notice if he slips away. So he sets his helmet on the chair and disappears into the crowd.

It doesn’t take long for him to turn a corner and run into Fandral, who laughs long and hard to see that Loki’s been pressed into service. But he helpfully provides Loki with a very useful piece of information: the four main actors have just finished a scene and have now been given a break while the crew preps for the evil wizard scene. Most everyone has scattered to various spots around the set, but Sif has stayed where she was, sitting on the grounds of the palace to enjoy the sunshine while she goes through some emails.

Loki thanks him, swallows hard, and makes his way over there.

The area is fairly deserted, save Sif, sitting on a wooden bench next to what appears to be a training yard. Her face is tipped up to enjoy the Norwegian sun, her eyes closed, so she doesn’t notice his approach, and for a moment he can just watch her.

He thinks this movie is silly, but he also thinks Sif has never looked better: she’s wearing silver armor, fitted to her figure, over a burgundy top and dark leggings; her face is artfully dirty; her hair streams, long and dark and glorious, down her back. Suddenly he thinks he might like _The Realm Eternal_ after all.

It would probably be creepy to just stand there and watch her all day, so he steps forward. “Sif.”

Sif starts and sits up straight, blinking against the bright sunlight, and as her eyes adjust and she focuses on him, a quick succession of expressions crosses her face: surprise, then pleasure, then concern, then a kind of cautious anticipation. He hopes that’s a good sign.

“Loki,” she says. “What are you doing here, and more importantly, what are you wearing?”

He glances down at his costume, and is just glad that he didn’t bring the helmet with him. “Falsworth broke his leg,” he says, opting to begin with the easy part of it. “Selvig asked me to step in.”

She blinks a few times, then stands from her bench. “Yes, but what are you doing in Norway?”

Ten hours on a plane, not nearly enough of it spent sleeping, gave him plenty of time to prepare to answer this question. Because Sif deserves a good answer—not his usual avoidance and clever remarks and cutting carelessness. So he takes a deep breath.

“I came for you.”

Sif looks surprised, but not displeased, and hopefully that’s a good sign too. “Why?”

“I needed to tell you,” he says, “I’m—” He really does hate this. But for Sif, he makes himself speak. “I’m sorry. What I said was terrible and untrue.”

Some of the tension seems to melt from her shoulders, but her expression stays solemn. “Thank you. Why did you do it?”

Of course Sif isn’t going to let him off quite so easy. “You caught me in a bad moment. I snapped at you. And I really shouldn’t have.”

She takes a step forward. “Why were you having a bad moment?”

She really isn’t going to let this go, is she? “Personal stuff.”

Another step forward, and now they’re nearly toe to toe. “What personal stuff?”

He wrangles his expression under control. “That response was meant to indicate that I didn’t want to talk about it.”

“Fine,” says Sif. “Then I’ll talk about it. You really hurt my feelings, Loki.” She hesitates. “But also maybe it’s a little bit my fault for ambushing you at your hotel when you’d already told me you didn’t have time to see me.”

“I like that you worry about me,” he insists. “It just . . . that happened to be a bad moment.”

Sif is silent a moment. She bites her lip, drawing his eyes to that spot, and she’s standing so close to Loki that he could just bend down and—

“I don’t want to ruin things,” she says suddenly, and her eyes are showing a curious mix of weariness and longing. “But, I mean, if there’s ever a moment for me to brave, I guess it’s when I’m dressed as a Viking warrior.”

He has no idea what she’s about to say, but he wants to put her at ease; putting Sif at ease will always be an instinctive need. “Then say it. And even though I’m dressed as an evil wizard, I promise not to turn you into a frog.”

The corner of her lips quirks into a smile, and then it drops, and her expression becomes very steady and earnest. “I was hoping, when I asked why you were in a bad mood at the hotel, that the answer would be that you were jealous over all the rumors about me and Thor.”

A stunned moment of silence passes.

And then another, and only after that does Loki’s brain stutter back into action—a confused, half-functional sort of action. She wants him to be jealous? Does that mean that she wants . . .?

Sif takes a deep breath. “Please say something.”

And all he can think to say is, “Why do you want me to be jealous?”

A grin twists her lips. “I guess if I can demand you explain yourself, you can do the same.” Another deep breath. “I don’t want to ruin things,” she says again. “But I do want to ask—because I can’t stop thinking about it—whether you’ve ever thought of me as anything more than a friend.”

And now Loki’s heart stops. “I’ve always thought of you as more than a friend,” he breathes, because apparently embarrassing honesty is what happens when his brain malfunctions.

Before he can start panicking about blurting out his most closely guarded secret, a megawatt smile fills her face. “Really?”

“That surprises you?” Loki demands, leaning forward. “I thought I was so obvious—”

“Not remotely!” she says, leaning in too, one hand coming up to his arm. “You always treat me just like any other friend—”

“Well you’ve never treated me remotely as if—”

“I flew to Vietnam for you, you think I’d do that for just anyone?”

“You were going to Thailand anyway,” he points out, and that’s the end of the discussion, because suddenly one or both of them moves that last few inches and Sif’s lips are on his, her hands sliding up his chest to loop around his neck, and he is threading ecstatic fingers through her long glorious hair and trying to avoid doing something embarrassing, like whimpering. Or just passing out.

All too soon Sif breaks away and presses her cheek against his; one or both of them is trembling, and they’re pressed too close together for him to be sure who it is. “You don’t know how long I’ve wanted to do that,” she whispers in his ear. “I’ve spent the last three years looking for any sign you felt the same way.”

He closes his eyes and pulls her closer. “I’ve spent the last twenty years terrified that you’d figure out how in love with you I am and you’d be disgusted. You’d want nothing to do with me.”

Her fingers tighten in the leather collar of his costume. “I wish I’d known,” she whispers. “I’d never have turned my back on you. And I might have realized how I felt earlier.”

“I want to kiss you again,” Loki says.

“Please do,” Sif says.

And that’s what they’re in the middle of when Loki very distinctly hears a male voice, tinged with a Norwegian accent, say, “This looks like a pretty private moment. Are they okay with you filming it?”

And they spin around to see that Fandral is filming all of this on his cell phone, giving them a very enthusiastic thumbs up, while behind him a giant of a man with braids in his beard looks bemusedly around at the whole scene.

“What are you doing?” Sif demands.

“I figured you’d want this for posterity,” Fandral says reasonably. “Plus this would be pretty good in the DVD extras.”

“As soon as I’m done kissing Loki, I’m going to punch you, all right?”

Loki is just pleased that Sif seems to have no interest in breaking her physical contact with him.

And he can’t help shooting a grin at Fandral. He might be very glad to have that moment on film later.

. . . . . .

Loki Odinson’s cameo as the gleefully evil wizard will become one of the highlights of _The Realm Eternal_ , and will spawn a series of new reaction gifs. No one except for a few people who were on set that day will suspect that his memorable and high-spirited performance was the result of his being filled with an overwhelming joy that he couldn’t tamp down, so he worked it into the character instead.

But that movie won’t come out for months. In the meantime, Loki spends a whole week in Norway after filming the cameo, unwilling to be apart from Sif any longer than he has to. But eventually real life interferes, and he has to go back to LA, and he and Sif have to start the complicated process of figuring out how to make time for a relationship between two people who travel constantly. But they make it work. They both go home to LA as often as possible, and when they’re apart, they text and Skype and make weekend visits back and forth.

The Internet is quite baffled when suddenly Sif and Loki are spotted out in public together, holding hands and stealing kisses; many a Thorsif shipper has to do some serious soul-searching. But some enterprising young person comes up with the ship name Sifki, which is better than Thorsif anyway, and they all jump onboard pretty quickly.

 _Okay,_ says @woodelf, _Sif and Thor were cute together, but Sif and Loki have chemistry hot enough to burn down a building._

(The non-shippers, the ones who’ve always suspected he’s gay, are a little more baffled, and a theory pops up on Tumblr that “the studio,” whoever that’s meant to be, is forcing him to fake a relationship with Sif to keep people from realizing The Truth. After Loki reads that, he decides to stay off the Internet for a while.)

So when _The Realm Eternal_ is released, the name of Loki Odinson is on everyone’s lips, given both the cameo and the new romance. A few days later, Fandral posts a screenshot of that video he took to his Instagram account, one that shows Loki and Sif on set, in costume and mid-embrace. When pressed, he says that he’s just happy that two of his favorite people are dating, and that he wants to put the doubters and the naysayers in their place. Jeff informs Loki that people have started shipping Sif’s character with Loki’s character, which is insane because they had two minutes of screen time together, but who can fathom the ways of Internet fandom?

Loki doesn’t much mind any of it. In fact he makes the picture the wallpaper on his phone.

In the meantime, _The Realm Eternal_ is a massive hit, and Loki’s two-minute scene does more to propel him to mainstream popularity than any of his previous work, which is honestly quite obnoxious, but whatever, he never wanted mainstream popularity anyway. And between that and the massive upsurge in popularity that Fandral’s Instagram post caused, he’s never been a more bankable star than he is at this moment.

He receives more offers to do more big studio work. Jeff thinks it could be good for him to do some of it, except for when he thinks Loki should tell these people to go jump in a hole. Just depends on the day and his mood. Honestly, Jeff is pretty mercurial.

Sif is more helpful. “Do it if you want. But if you don’t, well, doing your own thing has been working for you so far.”

Good advice. Reason #976 Sif is the best thing that’s ever happened to him.

. . . . . .

For the first time in fifteen years, Loki celebrates his birthday at his parents’ home. It’s a smallish group: Sif and Thor and Jane and Darcy and Odin and Frigga and Jeff and a few close friends. He’s never really been a big partier, and anyway, he’s feeling nostalgic for the old _Learning Quest_ days, and this is the closest he can get.

It’s a perfect night, the weather just right for sitting on the massive back patio. As they sit around with their drinks, Thor proposes a toast. “To Loki!” he says, one arm lifting the glass, the other around Jane’s shoulders. “An amazing brother and an amazing actor, and a man who can make even the stupidest evil wizard helmet look good.”

Loki rolls his eyes a little as everyone adds their voices to the toast, Odin’s “Hear, hear!” rising louder than the rest. Things are not fixed with his father, but they’re better. Enough that he’s referring to Odin as “Father” again, at least. Odin will probably never completely understand Loki, and the choices he makes, but they are both willing to attempt to have a warm family relationship anyway.

“To Sif!” Loki says, lifting his own glass. “Best thing that’s ever happened to me.” What he wants to say is “To Sif, the love of my life,” but they’ve only been dating ten months and even though she knows now that he’s been crushing on her since he was twelve, there’s still a part of him that worries about scaring her off by coming on too strong.

But when Sif smiles at him, their fingers entwined, her shoulder and knee warm against his, he knows its true. And from her smile, maybe she knows it too.

“When are you two going to be in something together?” Fandral asks.

Loki and Sif exchange glances, then look at Darcy, who grins and answers, “Early next year, hopefully.”

“Oh, you already have something in the works?” Frigga asks. “That’s lovely; I’d love to see you two on screen together again.”

“With Darcy directing?” Jane asks. “Sounds fun. What is it?”

Again Loki and Sif look at each other. “Kind of a romantic comedy,” Loki says.

Odin perks up. “Really?” he says, sounding pleased, because rom coms fall under his list of respectable genres, as he was in one in the 1970s.

Sif gives Loki a mischievous little grin. “Star-crossed lovers and all that.”

“Sounds excellent,” Odin says.

“And our characters are both vampires,” Loki adds.

Odin blinks, and Loki can almost see the moment he decides to be supportive. “Sounds . . . interesting.” Well, as supportive as Odin can manage.

Loki squeezes Sif’s hand. “Should be the easiest acting job ever,” he says. “Pretending to be in love with Sif.”

There are actual audible sighs at that.

“Enough sappiness!” Thor declares. “I want cake.”

Sif turns to Loki with a grin. “I think it’s cute when you’re sappy,” she declares, and leans in for a kiss. “Especially because you’re only sappy for me.”

“Don’t let that get out,” Loki requests. “I have a reputation to maintain.”

Sif snorts. “Sweetheart, the only way you’d agree to do a rom com is if you were a vampire. I think your reputation will remain intact.”

He grins at her, and she grins at him. And then they stand, and Loki Odinson, holding the hand of the love of his life, surrounded by family and friends, goes to get some cake.

. . . . . .

fin


End file.
